Jefferson County approves $5 million toward construction of amphitheater
Conceptual drawing of the proposed $50 million amphitheater, part of The Star Uptown development on the campus of the former Carraway Hospital in Birmingham.
The Jefferson County Commission Thursday approved the next step in making a 9,000-seat, $50 million amphitheater part of The Star Uptown development on the campus of the former Carraway Hospital.
A $5 million contribution from the county’s economic development fund goes toward building the event venue. The county also approved a guarantee to cover any shortfall on the project up to $10 million.
The matter was approved on a 3-1-1 vote with Sheila Tyson voting no and Lashunda Scales abstaining.
The panel vote came after citizens – mostly residents of the area where the venue will be built – voiced their concern about the future of their community. Those concerns included lighting, streetscapes and parking during events at the amphitheater and nearby properties at the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex, including Protective Stadium.
Scales responded to citizen comments by alerting them that those concerns should have been presented to the city of Birmingham before it approved its part of the project.
“The city should have already addressed this before it came to us to ask for financial support,” she said. “That’s why the president (Jimmie Stephens) keeps emphasizing that … the county commission is supporting an amphitheater. The community development portion of it is the responsibility of the city.
“This conversation should have taken place at the city,” Scales continued. “The city should have made sure that you all know … because they’re putting up the majority of the money.”
Tyson said the concerns expressed by residents should have been part of a contractual agreement.
“If it’s not in black and white in writing, you have no legs to stand on,” she said.
The development sits in Tyson’s commission district. Scales, whose district includes the nearby Norwood Neighborhood, repeated her concern of an apparent lack of minority involvement in the project.
“You have no African American, no women-owned business, no persons that have disabilities that I’m aware of that is participating in this project,” she said. “I’m gonna tell you where you need to go back and get your answers from, right across the street. I’m really kind of getting fed up with every time we come in as a support, it starts from there but it never ends there. It looks as though we are the driver (but) the city of Birmingham is the driver.”
Tyson said the project is set to include four parking decks. Stephens said plans for the development includes a 30,000-square foot grocery store.
“Good gracious, the community certainly does need that,” he said. “I’ll give you our word that we will do whatever we can to have the moral persuasion with the developer and with the city of Birmingham and operator, Live Nation. We will do what we can. But once we pass this, we’ve done what we need to do and it’s up to them to fulfill their obligations to the community and for the operation of the (amphitheater) itself.”
Lindsey Vonn says she suffered ‘complex tibia fracture’ in her Olympic downhill crash
The 41-year-old star said her torn ACL was not a factor in her crash. "While yesterday did not end the way I had hoped, and despite the intense physical pain it caused, I have no regrets," she wrote.
Guerilla Toss embrace the ‘weird’ on new album
On You're Weird Now, the band leans into difference with help from producer Stephen Malkmus.
Nancy Guthrie search enters its second week as a purported deadline looms
"This is very valuable to us, and we will pay," Savannah Guthrie said in a new video message, seeking to communicate with people who say they're holding her mother.
Immigration courts fast-track hearings for Somali asylum claims
Their lawyers fear the notices are merely the first step toward the removal without due process of Somali asylum applicants in the country.
Ilia Malinin’s Olympic backflip made history. But he’s not the first to do it
U.S. figure skating phenom Ilia Malinin did a backflip in his Olympic debut, and another the next day. The controversial move was banned from competition for decades until 2024.
‘Dizzy’ author recounts a decade of being marooned by chronic illness
Rachel Weaver worked for the Forest Service in Alaska where she scaled towering trees to study nature. But in 2006, she woke up and felt like she was being spun in a hurricane. Her memoir is Dizzy.
